Show Business: Old Play in Manhattan: Feb. 13, 1939

Henry IV, Part I (by William Shakespeare; produced by Maurice Evans). Though Henry IV contains the greatest comic figure in English literature, it has been produced on Broadway only once (for a week in 1926) in 43 years. One reason: the whole play cannot be performed in a single evening; another: Falstaff is not only the greatest but the fattest of comic figures, and a severe physical strain on any actor who, all padded and stuffed, impersonates him. For that weighty reason, Maurice Evans announced he would play Falstaff for only four weeks.

There...

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